Rejecting The GOP’s ‘Hezbollah Faction’: Where Are The Sane Republicans?
I found a lot to disagree with in Thomas Friedman’s column today, but his criticism of the Republican Party’s base rings true.
The Tea Party … is so lacking in any aspiration for American greatness, so dominated by the narrowest visions for our country and so ignorant of the fact that it was not tax cuts that made America great but our unique public-private partnerships across the generations. If sane Republicans do not stand up to this Hezbollah faction in their midst, the Tea Party will take the G.O.P. on a suicide mission.
This strikes me as fair, and it got me thinking about a question a friend of mine asked me the other day: where are the “sane Republicans” willing to “stand up to this Hezbollah faction in their midst”? Where are Bob Dole and John Warner? Why can’t John Danforth and Colin Powell express their disapproval for what their party is doing? Maybe some of Reagan’s old guard, like Ken Duberstein, could speak up?
The party is not without elder statesmen and women. They couldn’t possibly see their party’s antics on Capitol Hill and feel a sense of pride. Maybe it’s time they say so?
A regular reader recently passed along this item from Robert Prather, published a week ago on the center-right Outside the Beltway blog, about his sense of what’s become of the GOP.
I’ve been moving to the left for a few years now, but these idiots are radicalizing me. I’ve never voted for a Democrat in my life (full disclosure: I didn’t vote the last two elections due to moving), but I doubt I’ll ever vote for a Republican again. They’re either stupid or evil, but either way they’re dangerous and bad for the country.
I don’t know much about Prather’s political background, and maybe he’s an anomaly. But shouldn’t there be a legion of Republicans — former office holders, party loyalists, life-long members, all of the above — who are sympathetic to this perspective?
We’re not talking about GOP officials taking a hard line on some random piece of legislation, or nominating some radical for a key public office. We’re talking about congressional Republicans who’ve decided to play a game of chicken with the full faith and credit of the United States — something no American institution has ever done in more than two centuries — and who are fully prepared to trash the constitutional principle next week as part of a hostage strategy gone horribly awry?
Are there no noteworthy Republicans watching this, willing to say, “My party is simply going too far”?
By: Steve Benen, Contributing Writer, Washington Monthly Political Animal, July 27, 2011
Michele Bachmann’s Views, Not Her Headaches, Make Her Unfit
There is no doubt that Michele Bachmann gives many of us a headache. But to attack her, as Tim Pawlenty has done in such a sexist way, as unfit to be president because of migraines is absurd.
Many of our presidents have had health problems much more serious than headaches—Roosevelt, Kennedy, Taft, to name a few.
The problem with Michele Bachmann is not her migraines, it’s what is in her head. It’s her ideas that matter.
Just as Republicans who pay attention to politics were terrified of a possible Sarah Palin nomination, they are equally petrified that Bachmann might catch on in Iowa, South Carolina, and among the Tea Party wing. Could she, in fact, squeak by and actually win the nomination? Most think not, but they are nevertheless nervous when they watch her poll numbers rise, her bank account fatten, and the attention she is getting from the “lame stream media” increase.
There is no question about her misstatements and problems with facts (John Wayne’s birthplace, associating Jimmy Carter with swine flu, Founding Fathers working “tirelessly” to end slavery, maintaining that Obama issued “one oil drilling permit” when he issued 200, etc., etc.). Check out the Pulitzer Prize winning website Politifact for a disturbing list.
The real problems we should be focusing on are her outlandish and dangerous views on the issues.
Some are becoming very well known. Her views on gay and lesbian rights, for example. She believes gays and lesbians are “part of Satan.” She and her husband have mounted campaigns against gays and lesbians, beginning in Minnesota and now on the campaign trail.
She was against TARP and proudly proclaimed her opposition in the New Hampshire debate. Most economists believe that this saved the American economy from complete meltdown and a severe depression. Plus, most of the money is being paid back, and we have a strong American auto industry because of the actions of President Bush and President Obama.
She believes we should not only abolish the entire tax code, but we should abolish the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Education, the Department of Energy and the Department of Commerce. (Politico 4/18/2011, among numerous other sites) This is irresponsible, shortsighted, and destructive to the United States.
I find it extraordinary that Michele Bachmann should be even considered for the office of the presidency. Her views, her lack of competence and experience, and her minimal leadership skills all are much more worrisome than her headaches. Actually, just watching her out there makes my head spin.
By: Peter Fenn, U. S. News and World Report, July 25, 2011
GOP’s Debt Ceiling Fight Is About Bringing Down Obama
Impeach him.
Not the president. Barack Obama is holding a huge global and domestic crisis in his hand. To use a Washington metaphor, he’s dangerously close to being left “holding the bag” on the Treasury debt ceiling limit. He keeps talking sweet reason about the art of compromise to Republicans in Congress—not a language they speak. Obama played golf with the House Speaker John Boehner, a Republican who drones on about “small business” every chance he gets. Obama is not getting traction or making friends with Boehner because he does not grasp the conversation about the debt limit is not about the debt limit. It’s about taking his presidency down—this week—even if it hurts the United States of America, which it will. A small price to pay for this tea-drinking crowd of 87 GOP House freshmen which turned the chamber upside down six months ago.
“This is no way to run the greatest country on earth,” Obama declared in a belated speech, sounding a call to arms around the country, last night. That in itself says so much—he’s right, but he’s the man who’s elected by the people—not John Boehner who was elected by a small-town slice of Ohio—to run the country! Everything was calculated to leave Obama in the lurch—by Boehner, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor of the old Confederate capital, Richmond, Va. and at least one other mastermind. The conspiracy has succeeded flawlessly so far. They separated Obama from his own party in Congress; in his dealings with only Republicans he went way beyond Bill Clinton’s “triangulation” strategy. Obama made allies feel like they were shut out of the deal-making room when he offered concessions that cut at the heart of the Democratic Party‘s proud history on social programs dating to the New Deal.
The GOP—and I mean the George W. Bush years and the current crop of Senate Republicans, too—has a new deal for you, too. It’s called the New Steal. It goes like this: we’ll take all the peace and prosperity of the Clinton tax code years up until 2000 and then squander it on a couple unwinnable wars of choice—and by the way, make rich people pay less into the Treasury than they did during those golden years. They might start one of those illusory “small businesses.”
The reason President Clinton was acquitted at his impeachment trial in the Senate for a fling with Monica Lewinsky was because he built bonds of loyalty, teamwork and camaraderie with Democrats in both houses of Congress. Not one of them came forward on the floor to speak against him, except pious Sen. Joe Lieberman, who suggested a censure. He was utterly alone in his opportunistic little ploy. Clinton’s true friends all stood by him in the Senate—because he was their president.
Obama, a bit of a loner, needs more bosom buddies among lawmakers. In a crisis, you find out who your friends are. The one who could have steered him straight, sailing into the wind, was the late great senator, Edward M. Kennedy. When Kennedy got his Irish up and roared on the floor, he scared the forest. Obama does not scare the Republican jungle.
Let’s impeach Rush Limbaugh as the master of public dis-coarse. He’s the real reason we have so many angry white men in office who are plotting against the president. He’s writing the back-story of this debt drama, consulting closely with House Republican leaders step by step. I believe it even if I can’t see it because he did the same thing in 1994, in cahoots with Newt Gingrich, who recruited a new House Republican freshman class to take over the House. Yes, I saw Rush with my own eyes getting all the glory as class mascot at a fancy dinner at Camden Yards in Baltimore for the new Republican victors that enabled Gingrich to become speaker. The government shutdowns and showdowns against President Clinton resulted—remember?
By: Jamie Stiehm, U. S. News and World Report, July 26, 2011
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